Hot and Sour Soup

Who doesn’t love Hot and Sour soup!? Especially the Indian Chinese kind! Indian Chinese just means the food is cooked by Chinese immigrants that have lived in India for generations. The food they serve is a lot more (IMHO) flavourful and spicy than other Chinese food.

I’ve had this soup enough times in my lifetime to be able to reproduce this to restaurant perfection in the first try. And of course, I’m going to share this with you!

Don’t be scared with the large ingredient list – it sounds more complicated than it is!

You can easily make this a vegetarian soup by using veggie stock and omitting the chicken and egg.

Ingredients

2 litres of chicken stock

If using stock cubes dissolve 2 cubes per litre. Even if you use the cubes, just boil the stock and add any leftover pieces of veggies from this soup or anything in your freezer to enhance the stock. I always freeze pieces of veggies before they go bad and it’s ready at a moment’s notice to enhance any stock.

2 tbsps oil

12 spring onions – chopped bulbs only

4 tbsps finely minced fresh ginger

4 tbsps finely minced garlic

1/2 pound ground chicken

5 tbsps Sambal Oelek or chili paste

1/2 tsp ground black pepper

1/2 cup chopped white or brown fresh mushrooms

Sliced Shitake mushrooms – 300 ml can OR handful of dried mushrooms soaked in a cup of hot water

2 tbsps finely chopped coriander stems only

3 tbsps rice wine vinegar

3 tbsps dark soya sauce

4 tbsps canned bamboo shoots cut in julienne strips

1 carrot cut in thin julienne strips

2 tbsps firm tofu cut in julienne slices

2 tbsps cornstarch dissolved in a 1/2 cup of water

1/2 a beaten egg

1/4 cup chopped coriander leaves

1/2 cup chopped spring onion leaves

Process

Heat a few tbsps of oil and saute the chopped spring onion bulbs.

Add the chopped ginger and garlic. Saute for a minute and add the minced chicken and break it up so there are no lumps.